Folly Beach was a very different place in 1934 when George Gershwin walked out to the waves from the wooden house behind the dunes where he summered
Big band music backed beauty contests held on the pier, and the roads to the island’s ends were shady, sandy thoroughfares.
The quiet aesthetic that inspired Gershwin to write the score to Porgy and Bess, including the iconic song “Summertime,” still exists at 712 West Ashley Ave. The home of writers DuBose and Dorothy Heyward looks much as it did 90 years ago, thanks to the restoration efforts of local architect and owner Myles Glick and his late wife, Kathy.
Now, the house is on the market for $3 million. And as Glick passes stewardship of the Porgy House to a new owner, soaring home values, a lack of protection for historic homes on Folly Beach and the constant threat of hurricanes and rising waters leave the future of the landmark at risk.
A house with historical significance
The Heywards’ Porgy and its subsequent musical by Gershwin mark a turning point in American literature where Black subjects became primary protagonists versus deferential characters, like Jim in Huckleberry Finn. The original Porgy was the first Broadway production to feature an all-Black cast. The Heywards’ roles in that integration are often overlooked in South Carolina history.
Recognizing that historical weight, Folly residents and local preservationists gathered Dec. 3 in the salon of the Porgy House to discuss ideas for the future of the home and the formation of a community action committee.
“Something special happened here,” says community organizer Layle Chambers. “A South Carolina native-born son of aristocracy, a Midwestern girl who wrote plays, and a Jewish son of immigrants came here to write about the Gullah people in a way that was not condescending. If we do nothing, that could just be a memory.”
A tear-down vs. preservation
“This is not set up as a house but as a meeting place,” says Dr. James Ward, former professor of art and architectural history at the College of Charleston as he gestured around the Porgy House’s second-floor salon. The room, framed by a central fireplace and encompassed in walls and ceilings of dark cypress wood, served as a social hub in the 1930s. As writers and socialites, Ward explained, the Heywards needed a place to isolate and a place to host. They could retreat to their small writer’s booth behind the house or gather with fellow creatives in the salon.
“It’s not just the board-and-batten architecture,” says Ward. “That’s inspiration in itself, but it’s also the concept of the salon layout that’s so energizing.”
The Glicks felt that energy when they purchased the home in 1998, and Kathy shared it via private tours with writers and travelers until her passing in 2022. Her obituary highlights the “ultimate gift” she gave the community through the restoration and tours of the Porgy House.
The home continued to inspire writers during the Glicks’ tenure. Novelist Dorothea Benton Frank visited and made the home the centerpiece of her book, Folly Beach, and Charleston Stage director Julian Wiles wrote the musical Gershwin on Folly after repeated visits.
But since his wife’s passing, Myles Glick says the house has become a burden that he’s no longer able to properly maintain. He met with Folly Beach officials as recently as 2022 to discuss a sale but felt that the city lacked the funding and desire to maintain the house. After making significant repairs, he put it on the market in June 2024.
The home and writer’s booth sit on a half-acre spread over two lots, one row back from the beach. Folly Beach has no program to recognize historic homes or incentivize their preservation. Instead, city law prioritizes flood compliance. Owners of a historic house not raised high enough—like the Porgy House—are limited in the amount of money they can spend to repair their homes (50% of the appraised value every 10 years).
Folly Beach voters opted to cap short-term rental permits in 2023, meaning that buyers of smaller, non-flood-compliant homes have fewer options to balance cash flow with personal use. Home values have dropped, exacerbated by national trends, and many older homes are now effectively worth their lot value. The only rule to discourage tearing down a historic home is the $5,000 cost of a demolition permit for a home more than 50 years old, versus $500 for a newer home. The city has issued 10 demolition permits since January 2023, equating to the loss of an existing home on Folly Beach every two-and-a-half months.
That’s not the future Glick wants for the Porgy House, whose two lots could legally accommodate two new homes with marsh and ocean views from their top floors.
“I don’t want anybody tearing it down or even moving it over to one lot,” says Glick. “I want to preserve Kathy’s legacy. I want it to look the same way it does now, on the same property.”
Glick says that an easement will accompany the home’s sale to assure that the house is preserved in place and prevent the construction of a modern home on the lot. But nothing is in place today, and at a $3 million price tag, no serious buyers have stepped up since it was listed in June.
“The Porgy House is clearly the most outstanding cultural site for Folly,” says Nancy Moore of the island’s Tourism and Visitor Promotions Committee. That group proposed a historic marker for the house earlier in 2024, only to discover that a similar initiative was underway by the Exchange Club.
“It’s an indication of interest more than a lack of organization,” says Moore of an overlap she partially attributes to the home going on the market.
What may be next
Folly’s Tourism Committee is now funding a Porgy House state historical marker, but its draft language assumes placement on Center Street versus West Ashley Avenue, referring to the Porgy House existing “7 blocks west of this location” in the past tense.
Anna-Catherine Alexander, director of advocacy initiatives at the Preservation Society of Charleston, says that interpretive historical markers are a simple “low-hanging fruit” communities can use to foster a preservation mindset. She spoke at the December 3 meeting, suggesting that the Porgy House could be a fit for the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s network of Historic Artists’ Homes, which range from private ownership to public spaces.
In downtown Charleston, several organizations maintain home museums, including the Historic Charleston Foundation’s Aiken-Rhett House and Nathaniel Russell House, which faced heavy community blowback in the face of a potential private sale last year.
Carl Borick, director of the Charleston Museum, says that the museum’s Heyward-Washington and Joseph Manigault Houses wouldn’t be able to survive as standalone businesses, and instead rely on donations, grants, and support from museum admissions.
“It’s one thing to save a house; it’s another to operate it,” says Borick. “Without outside donor support, there’s no way these historic homes can operate on their own.”
Future stewards of the Porgy House will need to account for insurance, upkeep, and perhaps, personnel. Chambers sees the community action committee’s goal as “securing the property for the purpose of preservation” through a private buyer or group of donors. She compares it to the “Angel Oak effect,” when late-stage community organization prevented the construction of an apartment complex adjacent to the Angel Oak tree on Johns Island 15 years ago.
Chambers’ ideas to fund the home’s purchase range from long shots like attracting the attention of Lana del Rey—who covered “Summertime” in 2020—to finding grant money like the National Park Service funding being used to rebuild the Pine Tree Hotel on Sol Legare Road’s Mosquito Beach.
But if things don’t move quickly or an easement leaves loopholes, some neighbors worry about a worst-case scenario.
“If somebody bought it and tore it down to build a couple of new homes, we’d wonder how we allowed that to happen,” says Susan Peal, who lives two blocks away.
As the community action group (which meets again on January 15 and is open to new members) headed out into the cold last Tuesday, Layle Chambers closed by reflecting on the feeling of stepping back in time inside the Porgy House.
“You can’t put a value on this house,” she says. “That’s the problem and the beauty at the same time. So, what do you do with it? You either knock it down, or you try to organize in time to preserve it for the community.”
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